Meet Kim, a Strategic Deployment Leader within Allstate’s Field Sales department in the North Central Region.

Q: Tell us about your Allstate story: When did you join Allstate? What is your current role, and have you always been in this role?

A: I started at Allstate in 1997 as an admin for five field directors and worked my way through various positions in the sales organization. During this time, I finished my degree and got my MBA through Allstate. In 2006, I transferred to the North Central regional office, and in 2008 I became a Field Sales Associate (FSA) and promoted to New Agent Leader (NAL) in 2010. I transitioned into a Growth Leader in 2018 until I was most recently promoted to Strategic Deployment Leader (SDL).

Q: What’s different about Allstate?

A: If you look around, the people you work with have been here for a long time. When I first started I thought I’d stay here for maybe 5 years, but the opportunities are endless, everyone takes pride in their work and the people are incredible. I never thought I’d be here for 22 years. It just happened because you like where you work, and you don’t want to leave, it’s the people that make you want to stay. It really is about the people, this job could be at any company, but Allstate is like family and everyone really cares about each other, takes pride in each other’s development and will help you achieve your goals.

Q: What are you most proud of?

A: Helping others realize their dreams. Whether it’s working with a potential agency owner to open their own office or mentoring another employee, I truly enjoy helping others. I’ve been very fortunate during my Allstate career to have folks supporting my career development and have had the opportunity to mentor others as well.

Q: What do you enjoy about mentoring, and specifically mentoring other women in sales?

A:Allstate really values women in sales leadership, and there’s a large initiative to bring more women into leadership positions within sales. I enjoy connecting with others. When I am mentoring, I really make sure I am being transparent about my experiences, how I’ve navigated leadership as a woman and a person with young children and work life balance. I try to help others see how they can have that balance while growing in their career.

Q: What qualities do people need to be successful here?

A: To me, its not about the technical skills, its more about the relationship building skills. Every day I am adapting to different personalities and need learn how they respond to my communication style.

Q: Any advice for someone who is considering working at Allstate?

A: My advice is to be adaptable to change because in sales we need to quickly adapt to new processes all the time. The other piece of advice I would offer is that you always need to be ethical and transparent, willing to be open and willing to share your successes and failures with your team and agents you work with.

Q: Outside of work, what you can be found doing?

A: I love spending time with my family. I have a daughter who is 9, and son who is 5 and they keep me very busy! I like to travel and read when I have free time. Last year I was fortunate enough to travel a lot with Allstate. I traveled to Ireland and Scotland!

Meet Scott, Field Sales Associate in the Midwest Region.

Q: What is your current role and what does the role entail?

A: My role, Field Sales Associate (FSA), is essentially a Field Sales Leader (FSL) in training. I am training to lead a market of exclusive agents for Allstate. Depending on where you are in the country, FSLs lead 30-40 agents whose business results are your own business results. When your market’s agents succeed, you succeed.

As an FSA, I am going through the four phases of training to become an FSL. The phases include licensing and education, selling in an agency, recruiting future Allstate agents, and the mini-market phase. Once you’ve shown you’re an expert, you are able to jump in and once there’s an open market, I can apply to become a FSL.

Q: What drew you to sales? What do you like about it?

A: I never thought I would be a “typical sales guy”, but I was working at our regional office in Colorado as a marketing and education consultant where I worked working closely with agents. I realized my passion was supporting small business owners. I wanted my next career step to be supporting them on the frontline.

Q: What’s different about Allstate?

A: Allstate cares so much about developing their employees, and the amount of time and resources Allstate has poured in my development is unmatched. I’ve also been able to work with many members of the senior leadership team. It makes me proud to work here and gives me so much hope with all of the changes going on in our industry.

Q: What work are you most proud of?

A: I am still pretty new to my role, but I am proud that I have gotten five out of eight licenses within three months. I have also been learning how hard recruiting is. It’s been so fun to talk about the small business opportunity to potential agents.

Q: What are your biggest motivators at work?

A: My goal is to become a successful FSL as quickly as possible, whether that is studying for my tests or recruiting agents. I am continuously motivated to keep learning so I can truly contribute to the success of my market and make a large impact.

Q: What are your favorite parts about your job, the team, and the workspace?

A: I love the way the regional offices operate. The region is more fast paced than typical corporate environment. It is a very tight knit and collaborative community all working towards the same goal. You will be set up for success in terms of professional success and development.

Q: What qualities do people need to be successful here?

A: It’s important to be a quick learner and someone who likes to learn. Agents ask for your help with everything, and the nature of the job is that you need to know a little bit about a lot of things to be able to support our agents. Additionally, time management is critical. Make sure you prioritize your time between phases and working with agents.

Q: Any advice for someone who is considering working at Allstate?

A: People usually think you need to have a typical sales persona, but there’s such a wide variety between how sales leaders run their own markets. My advice is to be authentic to your own leadership style. Bring your whole self to your role and you will have a lot of success.

This is also a role where there is so much potential to learn. I’ve learned so much in my three months in this role and I’ve worked at Allstate for three years prior to being an FSA. Regardless of where my career takes me I will be set up for success because of the amount of knowledge I’ve learned in this role.

Q: Outside of work what you can be found doing?

I love basketball, I spend a lot of my time mentoring and volunteering with local HS students and volunteering coaching basketball

Fun fact: I’ve played basketball with over 10 NBA players- my favorite was Manu Ginobili. He was my neighbor growing up in San Antonio.

PRIDE at Allstate

At Allstate, Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) provide an open forum where employees with a shared interest aspire, develop and collaborate. Allstate supports and funds 11 ERGs, each with unique value propositions and goals.

During the month of June, PRIDE, Allstate’s LGBT+ ERG, hosts workshops and professional development events to help Allstaters build knowledge and expand resources. Jamie, national vice president of PRIDE, shared his goals for this year’s Pride Month activities.

“Our goal was for LGBT+ Allstaters to celebrate and feel visible, while also having conversations about where we still have work to do. We wanted to create space for people to be able to tell their stories. Storytelling has always been central to our community,and we want everyone to know that their story matters,” Jamie said.

Allstate hosted Toronto based non-profit, Rainbow Railroad, to share how they are supporting international LGBT+ individuals to escape persecution and violence. The event featured a personal story about the impact Rainbow Railroad had on one individual’s life, allowing employees to learn and potentially find new opportunities to give back.

PRIDE is not only focused on celebrating Pride Month, but making sure employees feel comfortable bringing their whole selves to work year-round.

Zee, co-leader of PRIDE in Allstate’s Jacksonville office, established a safe zone lunch-and-learn event where any Allstaters can come together and ask questions or learn about a topic that might be new to them.

Zee shared that the Safe Zone lunch-and-learn is a mix of people who identify as LGBT+ and allies who can come together for a meaningful discussion and leave with more awareness of issues facing the LGBT+ community. PRIDE also hosts Ally training at various Allstate locations to create a culture of inclusivity.

“It’s great to see that people feel more open and they can be themselves at work” said Zee. “We also teamed up with the PRIDE chapter in Largo, Florida, and went to the Pride Parade together! I love that PRIDE at Allstate has been growing and allowed me to meet people across the country.”

Mari Am Reflects on Her Time with SHPE

Allstate attended the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers 2018 National Convention. Read Allstater Mari Am’s reflection of her time there and why Allstate participated.

“In 2017, Allstate participated in the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers (SHPE) National Convention for the first time. SHPE does a great job of empowering Latinos and Latinas to be innovators in the different engineering industries. I was lucky to have been nominated to attend and represent Allstate for the full convention. I was amazed at the great talent that the SHPE had at the convention. This was also my call to action, I was motivated to make sure that Allstate had a bigger presence in this convention in the next year. I noticed that I had a lot of information and knowledge to share at the next convention.

Fast forward a year, I was fortunate to present at the SHPE National Convention with my peer, Nery. We shared our knowledge on how to be successful in the first 100 days of a new job. Our goal was to help graduates, interns and professionals have information that will help them as they started a new job/internship. It was great to see how our stories could help others in their career growth. During the convention, we attended other workshops that were inspiring. It was very motivating to see other Latinos and Latinas succeed in their own industry and share their knowledge to graduates starting their journey.

The true aha moment for me was during the last day of the career fair. A freshman student, who attended our presentation, stopped by the Allstate booth. She let us know how much she enjoyed the presentation and how it really helped her have a better idea of what is to come. She was so excited and energized, it was contagious! For Nery and me, it was the validation that we needed. At the end of the day we can’t influence the 7,700+ people at the conference, but knowing that we impacted even one person, made all the hard work worth it.

During the convention, I felt very proud of Allstate for its innovation, technology and community outreach. Those were the main points that I talked about with the students and professionals that stopped by our booth. A lot of attendees asked, “How is Allstate a technology company?” I think I can speak for all of us in blue shirts at the booth, we felt proud and honored to talk about how we are using innovation and technology to help our customers when they need us the most; when it truly matters to be the good hands company.

Allstate’s participation at SHPE allowed me to share my experience and pay it forward to my community. There is no better feeling than helping others succeed.”

The Professional Latino Allstate Network (PLAN) Employee Resource Group (ERG) has been selected by LATINA Style as one of the Top 20 Employee Resource Groups of the Year for 2018

PLAN’s commitment to mentorship and member empowerment. Allstate’s culture of diversity and inclusion allows all individuals to bring their whole selves to work and to succeed in their personal and professional growth. Read what Candace, the PLAN President, says about the ERG and its importance at Allstate.

“As with many others, when I first began my career with Allstate, it was difficult to navigate the large corporate setting. I felt as if I was in my own little bubble and wasn’t sure how to build my community. I was invited to attend a Professional Latinos at Allstate Network (PLAN) meeting where I learned about how my voice could have weight in a conversation and comfort that I could have a seat at the table. During that meeting, I met likeminded individuals with similar backgrounds and as I networked, I felt more comfortable in my ‘Allstate skin’.

The more I networked with PLAN members, the more I felt I belonged and that Allstate was the company for me; that I could navigate the large corporate setting and find my own path in an organization as large as Allstate. I became more engaged in my work, my network and I wanted to do more. I joined the PLAN community service committee and worked with non-profit organizations to enhance Allstate’s brand and reputation in communities we serve and that became a turning point for my involvement and engagement with Allstate.

I’ve been part of the PLAN board as a leader since 2008. As a member of the board, I grew personally and professionally outside of my daily work activities, from leadership, strategy development and planning to emotional intelligence and diversity training and so much more. Now as the president of PLAN, I’m honored to lead such an amazing team of individuals from across the organization and country. We collectively push the envelope and strive to provide our members and friends with the tools and support they need, to themselves, engage with Allstate at new levels and capacities. PLAN is important to Allstate, not only to encourage employee engagement, development and retention but to also provide open forums and opportunities where our members & friends can learn and grow with likeminded individuals with similar experiences and diverse backgrounds so that they can bring their whole selves to work.”

Ready to join a company committed to helping you grow in an inclusive environment? Apply to one of our open roles today.

Representing Allstate at NBMBAA

In September, a team of Allstaters attended the National Black MBA Association 2018 National Conference. Here is what Sharon, one Allstater who participated in the conference, said about her experience:

“Being able to attend the NBMBAA conference and represent Allstate was a great reminder of how important it is to be present and connect with diverse communities of talent. The NBMBAA offered tremendous opportunities to celebrate the journey and the successes across the black community while becoming more aware of the challenges and setbacks the community has faced and still faces today. As someone who was both trying to attract and engage these talented MBA students to Allstate opportunities and trying to understand experiences of African Americans in the workplace, I found myself even more heightened and inspired to bring it back to the work my team and I are doing around recruiting at Allstate.

“It made me feel very proud to be there on behalf of Allstate!”

I walked away from the event feeling that no matter who you are or what job title you hold, you are positioned to make a difference in your own work culture by giving power to the voice that isn’t represented in the room. Whether it’s by actively seeking diverse talent to join your organization or to join you working teams, by listening to and embracing others’ perspectives, becoming more aware of privileges and how they can be used toward making a difference and ensuring we are bringing a deeper and richer perspective to the conversation. To me, that was pretty powerful!”

Effective July 1, 2014, under Indiana House Enrolled Act (HEA) 1242, it is against public policy of the State of Indiana and a discriminatory practice for an employer to discriminate against a prospective employee on the basis of status as a veteran by refusing to employ an applicant on the basis that they are a veteran of the armed forces of the United States, a member of the Indiana National Guard or a member of a reserve component.

To view the “EEO is the Law” poster click “here”. This poster provides information concerning the laws and procedures for filing complaints of violations of the laws with the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs

To view the FMLA poster, click “here”. This poster summarizing the major provisions of the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) and telling employees how to file a complaint.

It is the Company’s policy to employ the best qualified individuals available for all jobs. Therefore, any discriminatory action taken on account of an employee’s ancestry, age, color, disability, genetic information, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual and reproductive health decision, marital status, medical condition, military or veteran status, national origin, race (include traits historically associated with race, including, but not limited to, hair texture and protective hairstyles), religion (including religious dress), sex, or sexual orientation that adversely affects an employee's terms or conditions of employment is prohibited. This policy applies to all aspects of the employment relationship, including, but not limited to, hiring, training, salary administration, promotion, job assignment, benefits, discipline, and separation of employment.